Twitter is the paradox of the social media marketing world. It is both the most simple and the most complex of the large social networks. The potential rewards are tremendous, while the potential failures are monumental.
This is one part of a five part series that will be posted on various sites. It covers the basics: a 30,000 foot view of the various social media sites as well as easy, practical ways that the sites can be used.
Why Do Car Dealers Need Twitter?
For all intents and purposes, car dealers do not need Twitter. It is a luxury. It’s a site that, if used properly, can help in many ways, but if used improperly or barely at all it can be detrimental. I do not recommend using Twitter without making a commitment to participate, engage, and never to spam.
Luckily, it’s not a large commitment. Five minutes a day, 4 or 5 days a week is enough. Ideally, it’s used more, but a car dealer can have a strong Twitter presence with minimal time spent. How? The beauty of Twitter is that it’s short. People have 140 characters to get their message across, so being succinct is a good thing.
Those willing to commit to 5 minutes or more per day can take advantage of the excellent exposure, search engine ranking potentials, and social media “credibility” that comes with having an active Twitter account.
Join Now, Even if You Aren’t Going to Use It
Regardless of whether or not you’re going to use Twitter, you should create an account for your dealership’s name. Signing up takes 2 minutes. If you do not intend to use Twitter, simply create the account and leave a single tweet linking to a contact page on your dealership. Why? If you don’t get your name, someone else will eventually.
For those willing to use Twitter as a marketing tool, setup comes down to 4 steps:
- Upload your avatar – You can use your own picture, the company logo, or even simply a picture of the types of cars you sell.
- Create a background – Using one of the default backgrounds is fine, but we recommend a custom background. A nice, easy, and free way to do so is to use Twitbacks.
- Fill out your profile – You can put in one link as your homepage and you have 160 characters to describe yourself. Be honest. There’s no need to try to encourage additional engagement by pretending to be something you’re not.
- Set up your mobile - This is optional. Some enjoy tweeting from their smartphone. Others do not. More details of this will be available during the Automotive Internet Boot Camp (described below).
You’re On Twitter. Now What?
Start “tweeting”. The site asks, “What are you doing?” Some take this literally and will post every detail of their lives while they’re doing it. Others use it to talk to others online. Many post links to interesting things they find.
Most spam. Sadly, Twitter is overrun with spammers who use either automated tools or manually spam Twitter with links to their products and services. Many car dealers have fallen victim to services that promote the idea of feeding their inventory into Twitter. The is not effective and can help to label your dealership as a spammer.
The easiest way to use Twitter effectively is to engage. Use the search tool to find people in talking about the kind of cars you sell. Answer questions; people will often post things such as “What does this warning light mean on my Infiniti G?” or “I’m considering a Camaro and a Mustang. Which should I get?”
Use the search feature to find people discussing your area. It doesn’t have to be automotive related. If you’re in Boston and you’re a Celtics fan, find people talking about the Celtics. Reply to them with your thoughts. “Yep, I saw that Garnett dunk. It was HUGE!”
Sounds silly, right? In many ways, it is. In many ways, Twitter itself is silly, but those who are engaging with others, replying to their posts and getting involved with conversations are the ones who are able to effectively market on Twitter.
Why Should I Engage on Twitter?
There are two reasons that people should engage via Twitter rather than spam. Engagement is required to gain interest in your Twitter account and to establish that you’re a real person.
The other reason is more complex and cannot be covered in detail here, but think of Twitter as a cocktail party. Conversations often migrate to occupation and business. When you “make friends” at a cocktail party (or on Twitter) there is a good chance that people you mingle with may be in the market for a vehicle. Again, we’ll discuss this in much more depth at the Boot Camp.
What About My Inventory?
I have been asked many times, “If I can’t post my inventory, what’s the point?”
I always remind them that they shouldn’t feed their inventory through Twitter. Posting inventory, especially when it means something, makes sense. Nobody is interested in seeing a 15 Ford Focus inventory pages on their Twitter stream. If they see that, most will block your account. Enough blocks and Twitter will automatically ban your account. Getting it back is nearly impossible.
Imagine people searching for your dealership by name, finding your Twitter account on the search engines, and clicking through to see what you’re saying. If you’re banned, it doesn’t look good, especially if they’re one of the millions of people using Twitter regularly.
When I say “especially when it means something” I am referring to posting the right vehicles at the right time. While you don’t want to post 15 Ford Focus detail pages, there’s nothing wrong with saying “Just got in a shipment of F-150’s. We’ve never had this many at once. [link to F-150 search page]”
Nobody cares about the 1999 Honda Civic you got in on trade, but if you happen to get a 1982 DeLorean (a la Back to the Future), you’ll definitely want to tweet that.
As far as the right time to tweet inventory, think of every engagement tweet as a “credit”. If you’re engaging with people most of the time, you earn the right to tweet an occasional inventory item or special. It’s based upon how much and how well you’re tweeting. If you’re tweeting off and on throughout the day, it’s possible to have several “business” tweets daily without being labeled a spammer.
There’s So Much More
Working with Twitter for Car Dealers could be a long workshop. In fact, it most likely will be (at least in part). In February just prior to NADA 2010, Paul Rushing, Brian Pasch and I will be holding an Automotive Marketing Boot Camp in Orlando. There, we will get more in-depth with various topics ranging from social media to SEO in a classroom style setting. Unlike most automotive conventions and conferences, the training done at the boot camp will be much more comprehensive.
For now, you can continue to the next part of this series, Car Dealer Social Media Basics: Blogging.
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Read more about Twitter for Car Dealers on this blog.
